This was the mantra of civil rights leader Dorothy Height who passed on Tuesday evening in hospital at the great age of 98.  While Dr. Height was a shining example for women during a time when women were definitely considered second class citizens, the fact she was a black woman only made that situation worse.  Even with those odds stacked against her she managed in her lifetime to be a key part of change in this country. Dorothy Height stood by the side of Martin Luther King, Jr during his famous I have a dream speech in Washington D.C. and was the highest ranking woman in the civil rights movement leadership. She witnessed, had a part in organizing  and/or participated in every march and demonstration at the time and spent her entire life in what at the time may have seemed like an un-ending struggle. 

For 40 years Dorothy held the position of leader of the National Counsel of Negro Woman and did tremendous work in the areas of gender equality and desegregation of the armed forces.  For her work she was awarded two of the highest civilian awards given by our government, The Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1994 and the Congressional Gold Medal in 2004 and was praised by both George W. Bush, and President Barack Obama who called her,  “the godmother of the civil rights movement” and a hero to all Americans.

NeedTooKnow.org would like you to take a moment out today and think about the works of civil rights leaders and the immense work they have done so far because that work has not yet ended.

Unless you have spent the last several days on a wilderness trip or are just living under a rock then you have not heard about the Apple iPad. Well we assume our readers are all in the know. Apple has once again taken on a established market and elevated it to an all time high. Using technology and the great Apple hype machine. What you needtooknow about this machine is simple, is this device as great as they hype is making it out to be?

The short answer to the question is yes, but there are some shortcomings to this innovative product.  First of all the price for this device ranges from the currently shipping $499 version that includes 16Gigabytes of storage space for movies, music, apps, and data and Wifi connectivity, meaning you have to be near a wi-fi hotspot or in your home using your own wi-fi to access the internet, to the fully expanded but not currently shipping $829 version that has 64 Gigabytes of storage space for movies, music, apps, and data, and wi-fi as well as a cellular connection that will give you internet access anywhere you may be.

If you have an Apple iPhone you will be very familiar with this device, since it’s basically a large form factor iPhone without the phone functions and the camera phone. However the camera phone technology is expected to be added in on later versions.  Will this device be able to replace your desktop computer or home computer? Well probably not but more likely to serve as an extension of your current computer or laptop.  You should know the iPad does not currently support the ability to print out documents and does hot have any ports for expansion other the the single Apple connector port so expansion and connection to other devices is limited.  You can however pair wireless Bluetooth keyboards and headsets to your iPad pretty easily but that’s about it currently. 

You also should keep in mind that while this device can function as many things including a reference device, a book reader, a presentation device, a  media player, a game machine and much much more, be advised along with apps and media there is an associated price tag, to buy music, books, movies, etc are all the same prices they are in the iTunes store. There are a number for free and cheap apps in the iTunes store as well that will cover your basic needs but the more complex the functionality the higher priced the apps tend to be.

So if you are a little flush with cash, or if your income tax refund is burning a hole in your pocket this may be a great device to have around the house for media consumption.

Historically the Census was done by hand and someone would go to every household in America and count the number of people in the home. Slaves however were were counted by what was known as the Three-Fifths Compromise of 1787 which said for ever five slaves only three would be counted as individuals. And of course American Indians weren’t counted or taxed for that matter at all since they weren’t considered citizens proper.

To this day the Census bureau believes they have never accurately counted every American citizen which is one of the largest controversies associated with the Census, because if everyone is not being counted then how are the statistical allocations of funds and programs accurately being applied to any particular area or group.  Well that’s literally the billion dollar question.  

To learn more about the census stop by http://www.census.gov/ there is tons of info and a real-time population clock for both the US and the world.  Also check out the embedded video below it has important information about the barcode label on your census form.

Well a few years ago there was an ad being shown everywhere on TV and on the side of busses and carried around on a truck all over the city with CEO Todd Davis’s social security number. He claimed his company could protect anyone from being a source of identity theft.

Not long after these ads started running someone used Todd Davis’s social security to secure a loan for $500. Just enough to show his service was bunk but not enough to make a federal case of the whole situation.

Finally LifeLock has been exposed in court and fined $12 million dollars for deceptive business practices by the federal trade commission. Arizona state court went as far as to label LifeLock as a con operation. Lifelock has obtained millions of dollars in fees, far more than the $12 million dollars they are being fined, but they also have personal information and credit rating for many many of their customers. Check out this article in wired magazine.  Also if you were a LifeLock customer your entitled to some refund money so get in contact with the Arizona attorney general’s office.

  This is not the first time LifeLock has come under scrutiny. It seems the founder Robert Maynard Jr, who supposedly stole his fathers identity to obtain an American Express Card. Now the company lawyers have investigated into this case and other charges involving gambling debts and a previous company bankruptcy, however to this time nothing has been proven and Maynard has not been charged formally be any other attorney general However he did step down from his post as co-founder of lifeLock in 2007.

As of late these two words have never been more relative in my life than they have ever before. I normally consider myself pretty savvy and have a certain amount of street smarts, normally I can see a scam coming a mile away but recently I was snagged in by one of the oldest tricks in the book. Our country is undergoing a financial strain like no other since the depression. It is affecting just about everyone except maybe the super-rich. At a time like this we are all at our weakest, and just as in any society there will be those who will use that weakness to exploit others.

A few weeks ago a relative of mine dropped by very happy about having heard something on the radio about being able to get $1000 voucher for groceries as part of the economic stimulus plan. Now normally I would ignore claims like this but she was so sure and claimed that she received her voucher already and was in the midst of using her voucher. So she passed on the phone number for me to call and also gave it to my mother and we both called individually and signed up. We both spoke to a customer service agent from a company called Grocery Relief who said that they were helping low to middle income families affected by the economic downturn to help get groceries from major manufactures. So they asked a few personal questions about my income and how much I spent on groceries in a 1 month period. After a few seconds the gentleman was happy to report that I fall within their guidelines and would be eligible for the $1000 voucher. He took my mailing address and all the pertinent information. Then the very last thing he asked me for set off some alarm bells but not enough to totally freak me out. He informed me there was a fee of $4.90 for application processing and if I preferred for rush processing I could pay $9.90. So of course I asked why this was required he told me that it’s how the company was able to offer this information to the public and how they paid for the radio and newspaper advertisements. I thought this was a little odd but not completely without merit. Looking back I don’t know what I was thinking. Anyway I gave him my information. I was assured I would receive a voucher in the mail after a few days.

After a few minutes of what I can’t describe any more plainer than buyer’s remorse I decided to get online and do a little research about this Grocery Relief program surely if this was something legit there would be feedback on the web with people all praising this whole package. So I Googled Grocery Relief and found nothing but bad news, including two news articles that included a woman from Greenville, South Carolina who had got taken for $709.00 over a few months’ time by random charges being added to her credit card without her permission. Another article also talked about smaller multiple charges added to their card account. After some further research and a phone call to the BBB I discovered what Grocery Relief is doing isn’t exactly illegal but it’s sort of a coupon club. You pay a certain amount to join the club and every time you order coupons they charge you a smaller amount for the coupons. It’s sort of like having a Costco membership. You pay once to be in the club and you pay for your individual purchases but those purchases are supposed to save you money in the end. The scary part however is the fact that they now have all your information including credit card number, address, personal information about your income, and even some extent your spending habits.

So what happens now, well I contacted my bank and they have put things into place to make sure no other charges can come thru from this company and they have also charged back the initial $9.90 from the original charge. So right now I am ok, but if this company decided to sell my information or in some way try to exact some revenge I could be in for a long time battle. So this is a lesson I had to learn the hard way. I am sharing it publically so that maybe others won’t make the same mistakes I made and will learn when something doesn’t sound quite right immediately put your foot on the breaks and bail out right away.

Just something we all need too know!

UPDATE:

Since I wrote this story I have been doing more investigation.  The website www.groceryrelief.com which last week didn’t work now has an under construction message and password protection. This happened a day after I looked up who owned the URL and made a call or two. So someone is behind this program and they are trying to cover their tracks to make themselves look a little more legitimate.

The official whois record is below:

Whois Server Version 2.0

Domain names in the .com and .net domains can now be registered
with many different competing registrars. Go to http://www.internic.net
for detailed information.

   Domain Name: GROCERYRELIEF.COM
   Registrar: NETFIRMS, INC.
   Whois Server: whois.netfirms.com
   Referral URL: http://www.netfirms.com
   Name Server: NS665.HOSTGATOR.COM
   Name Server: NS666.HOSTGATOR.COM
   Status: clientDeleteProhibited
   Status: clientTransferProhibited
   Status: clientUpdateProhibited
   Updated Date: 19-jul-2009
   Creation Date: 18-jun-2008
   Expiration Date: 18-jun-2010

Netfirms.com is a website registration site that is masking the true identity of who actually owns www.groceryrelief.com  and of course www.groceryrelief.org is a simple advertising landing page designed to generate income when you click on any of the links on that page. This whole organizations stinks of scam and I have yet to fine anyone who has offered any information to the contrary. So once again Buyer Beware!

We will be working with out sister site mtypencenter.org and other sites across the net to bring interesting content in different media forms all across the net. And with a  little help hope and luck we can make this site a successful hub for information and social understanding and just things that you need too know.

I have a Kindle but one thing to know about a Kindle is reading a technical book or textbook can be a nightmare.  Amazon has built in tons of bookmarking and note taking features but flipping back and forth thru Kindle pages just isn’t fun.  Not to mention screenshots and charts in monochrome don’t always illustrate well, and of course every book sold on Amazon isn’t on the Kindle.

I went to Borders a few weeks ago after work to get a gift for a friend and pick up a few tech books. I signed up for  the Boarder’s Club Card, where they promise you the standard discounts and specials that come along with most of these type cards.  Anyway I decided to purchase two books using their online bookstore:

   and 

The Windows 7 Secrets book at Boarders sells for 49.99 and the Powershell Book sells for 44.99 to me this seemed a little high so I zipped over to Amazon.com.  On Amazon the Windows 7 Secrets book is marked down from 49.99 to 31.49   And the Windows PowerShell is marked down from 44.99 to 29.69 so of course I whip out my trusty Borders Club card and do some quick calculations and even with my 30% discount, tax & shipping it’s still cheaper to get the books from Amazon.  I also went to Barnes & Noble as well, while the books were marked down a little cheaper than Borders. Still Amazon’s prices were rock bottom and since Barnes & Noble has stores in my state of course tax is added.

It doesn’t take rocket science to figure out that I  ordered  with Amazon yesterday and the books are due in today or tomorrow.  I am almost sad that the old brick and mortars are going the way of the dinosaur. Some of my fondest memory’s of going to B&N after school with friends and just sitting on the floor reading books. That experience is going to replaced by spending about 30 seconds with my UPS man signing for packages.

Btw if your interested in any of these titles here are the links on Amazon:

Yahoo is using all the key buzzwords including Friends (social networking), consume, earn, flirt, all in new ways that you can control. Yahoo seems to be re-invigorating the idea of portal/landing pages that pulls in all your information from desperate sources to your Yahoo landing page.

The biggest question is can Yahoo thought of as a company that has been becoming more and more irrelevant make a turn around to it’s glory days.